Arty shell cams and Guided arty shell cams

Not to mention that in artillery you are just sitting inside an area a couple of miles away from the action and all you are doing is firing multiple shots then waiting a bit to see where you hit on the minimap, then you start screaming for a scout to give you an arty target. Cause then you can see all the people dieing and shit and the buildings getting hit and then it gets fun.

 

Yeah, my goal is to make game ending weapons actually fun and make empires easier to learn. I think those are the winning formulas.

 

i guess you make a point hehe. good people can take out bases, but they keep shelling the same area and not realizing theres nothing left. i support arty shell cam, but not the guided part (unless another element was added to it, like scout targeting).

but yeh go for artie cam. the view through the cam should be fuzzy and unclear to add to the atmosphere and affects.. or some kinda effect like snark vision or thunnel vision. i also think when the shell hit the ground, u should make the view go static.. like TV static, to convey the feeling that the connection with the shell was terminated.

will the cam view take up whole screen or just a corner?

 

The cam can be the whole screen or on just the mini map. This is an idea open for suggestions really.

I think you have the wrong impression on the guided shells. You say you don't support it yet give no reasons as to why. It's not a rocket that you can just fly around on the map with. It's a shell that you take control of once it descends. It doesn't have to move a lot, say a 20 feet radius from where it would of normally landed.

Basically it would be a fun way to make arty effective with out being OP. You could guide the shells onto a few people building a turret or some poor guy that is trying to run away from it.. If you work hard enough to get the money for arty to win the game you should be rewarded with a fun experience. Not a chore.

 

what...
The bison is terrible. s-57 (I think its called) would of been a much better example.

 

Well I dunno Dubee...sounds like a splat that you can't get away from, tbh. Getting shelled in your base is no joke, and I guess it most happens on slaughtered and money. On slaughtered, once the BE base is getting shelled, it's pretty much getting to be their loss and they move buildings away to even stay in the game, losing the ref.

If you could guide, that'd be a short short ending, which is good in a way, but in another way it just kinda means game over.

Arty is a mid-late game weapon, but on some maps it just means game over. Try to keep that in mind.

 

That wasn't the point!

I think it would be a good system though. Instead of a camera attached to a shell, you can see the entire map like the Commander, just in a top down view only. Obviously, you would only be able to see buildings that have been spotted or have friendly infantry/tanks/buildings nearby.

 

i know what u mean with the descending part. actually its kinda cool now that i think of it.. itll be like firing a smart bomb at them terrorist NF.

 

Think of it like this. If your guiding one you can't be shooting a bunch. So it would be more accurate yes(and more fun) but you would be firing shells at a much slower rate. And I have to disagree with you. Getting shelled in your base currently is a joke because all you have to do is stay in the barracks and repair it. Arty should be killing shit, not giving the enemies easy repair points.

I also disagree with your stmt saying its a mid game weapon. It has always been an end game weapon. With the cost and the time it takes to research it on top of the shells you need to research for it. Plus its pretty easy to kill an arty tank as it is. Also your problems with it can be fixed by just making it take longer to research or more expensive. Guiding it won't make the game end faster, it will just get you more points. But you honestly think those shitty 2 hour stalemates on slaughterd and money are good? Or should be considered when balancing the game? That's like balancing the game based around district. Game ending weapons should mean game over.. And you should have fun doing it.

 

it all coems down on how accuracte the guidance system is. i actually dont mind seeing it being tested.

I do see pros pwning with it, but it will give noobs a chance to use it well. there is one thing im wondering.. since artie has such a huge area of effect.. would the guiding matter too much? atm i just fire randomly with feedback until i hit something then i keep hitting it till reloading for the next magazine of arthie shells.

i agree with both sides..
1) its a little bit overpowered depending on who uses it.
2) itll be kinda cool
3) itll help noobs use it instead of hitting jack shit and wasting 900 resources when they get analed by a grenadier or tank.
4) guidance might not matter because of high damage radius already

i suggest makign the damage radius smaller but more powerful. id liek to go back to a suggestion in the past.. anti tank artie shell. of course someone mentioned that the driver can position an artie tank so its more like a cannon.. and just rape tanks at a bottle neck. but i dont see that TOO often, although it probably occurs.

 

I think the type of guide he thinks is a free fall one where you can move it either left or right, and it wont move too far unless you started moving it from the highest point possible, it's just in case you wanted to hit lets say the rax to the left of the vf instead of the vf. Something like that.

 

Exactly. And if you shoot too high it will lose range. Just think of the predator missles in COD:MW2 with a little less responsiveness and no turbo obviously. It will basically just make arty more accurate and fun to use. I don't see any way it could be overpowered.

 

Ok let me just say I meant Money when I said midgame. And Slaughtered? A good team can't really do much about it at that point...it takes another 10 mins or so to end it tho.

The guide, well, I have to say the rof on arties isn't usually so long that i've got more than 1 shell in the air actually. You guys have been saying that, unless i've misread it? I've like...not really had that happen to me much..

The point about arty guidance being more of a killer is an area systematically being destroyed, then moved on to the next area. The main point with artillery is you can't see what you're shelling, so the defender has a chance that you'll shell a wall like a muppet or something. With a camera, that's pretty much removed and you will always hit your target if you're fairly decent at it.

I also disagree about the rax thing, but you're missing the point there. Those engies dedicate their lives from that point on to just be repairing that rax, it effectively takes them out of the game, and usually can overpower just one engy, and often two if they're pub standard. That means they're now tied to the rax, and tbh it's not easy keeping those things up because you're now underpowered on the front. Even if you don't take into account the other fallout from buildings which always happens.

The engy free points is like...what a waste of a statement. Perhaps you need to spend more time being tied to a base while it's being shelled. I have rarely seen someone get a lot of points in that situation which will then help them. Usually, that spells the end of the game, unless you have heavies and they have arties and meds instead.

I'm kinda surprised to hear that tbh. So few have the times been when i've been happy about being shelled.

Edit: BUT, with the removal of targets, this might not be so bad. The main problem with arty is that bases are often static, clustered around ref points. Everyone knows where to shell to hit at least the ref, but other things...that's the saving grace of arty...you need someone on the ground to find it.

 

We have wages now! So getting points from repairing might help the losing team pull a win. Or extend the game another 5 minutes..

As for the guided arty, lower refire rates to 10%, cut the explosion radius, and raise the damage. The current cannons could be used for a certain job.

HE: Medium damage/Medium radius/Medium range - Anti Infantry
ER: High damage/Low radius/Long range - Anti Building/Tank if they're accurate..
Med: Medium damage/Small radius/Medium Range - People use these..?
Small: Low damage/Small radius/Short range - - - ^

 

Good point! :D

 

meh supports

 

I support the Idea of a Minimap camera, that follows the currently fired shell, but goes offline 1 second after you hit something.

that way, you can still fire rapidly, but don't get the camera, because the camera moves to the newest shell. on the other side, you have the option to wait till the shell hits something, you watch where it hit and only then fire again. that gives the enemy team a breather, as you sacrifice rapid destructive power with accuracy. well, until you zeroed in, then have fun shelling!

of course only when you have artillery feedback, or else it be OP.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5j_zfJSyoc&feature=related

kinda like that: but thanks for the source engine, artillery shells are allot faster in Empires... also a good example how scout marking SHould work, a constant camera in the area for the artys, but that isn't important right now.

I also support the differenciation of the artillery guns. He being a big radius infantry killer with medium range, ER being an accurate building/tank killer with less Radius.
sorry, I forgot the name who posted that.
medium, I think should be the jack of all trades, average cannon, small, being able to have 2, should be the spammer arty, weak, close combat, but a constant brutal barrage..

 

oh just came in mind: when u have arty feedback and u follow the shell with ur view, how would that work with multiple shells?